I attended both the afternoon and evening readings of this year’s Thousand Islands Writers Festival. What a day! The authors were fantastic. The afternoon session was historic novelist Roy MacSkimming who read from his novel Laurier in Love. The other afternoon presenter was biographer Charlotte Gray who told how she went about researching her book Gold Diggers about the Klondike gold rush. This book was a change from her usual style in that rather than the vertical slice of a person’s life from birth to death, she took a horizontal piece of time and from that chose six people who were all involved in the gold rush in the Canadian north. Both were excellent speakers and kept the audience enchanted.
The evening presenters were three novelists – all women who write in different styles. Two women wrote in a man’s point of view – Tish Cohen and Elizabeth Kelly, and Alissa York. Elizabeth went one step further and wrote in the first person from her main character’s viewpoint.
The three had never met before this evening and got along with each other famously. Sometimes putting three strangers together with such different personalities can be disastrous but in this case it worked a charm.
All in all, it was a very delightful and entertaining day. Can’t wait until tomorrow when it’s back to the historic court house for Words and Wine 2 – Murder at the Court House where we will be entertained by three mystery writers.